


respite

by asphelid



Category: Blaseball (Video Game)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Prompt Fill, Season/Series 07, was i projecting when i wrote this? maybe, what can i say lesbians good
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-03
Updated: 2021-01-03
Packaged: 2021-03-13 01:40:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28520277
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/asphelid/pseuds/asphelid
Summary: It’s like Jaylen's rotting away from the inside out these days, like she’s making up for lost time. It’s impossible to deny the blood pull at the heart of her, raw against the transience of her will. With every game, every wrong pitch, she becomes more myth than human. It’s all a balancing act, and Jaylen is losing.
Relationships: Jaylen Hotdogfingers/Sutton Dreamy
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	respite

**Author's Note:**

> written for the prompt "12. things you said when you thought I was asleep". thanks to @kosy for sending it in- i had a lot of fun writing this. if dreamyjaylen aren't your favorite lesbians then what's the point of it all?
> 
> set in early season seven. warning for some swearing but that's about it. hope you enjoy!

Sleeping through the night is out of the question entirely at this point, but this is the worst time to wake up. It’s not light out yet, won’t be for hours, but the city isn’t silent enough for Jaylen to fall asleep again. Judging by the ambient noise seeping in through the window behind the kitchen table, fans are already swarming in for an early Garages-Tigers game. 

Sometimes there’s the light patter of rain to drown it all out, especially this time of year, but tonight there’s nothing to keep her and her thoughts company. Nothing to pay attention to.

Jaylen used to think she was a shitty sleeper, even before everything. Now she could kick herself for whining over five hours of rest. It’s not about the exhaustion anymore– it’s about the loneliness. The physicality of the thing that never quite feels so bad when she’s got someone else to focus on. She can never get her mind to rest when she’s alone, and with Dreamy sound asleep in the other room, Jaylen feels more isolated than ever. Alone comes so easily these days, but the noise never leaves. There is no peace.

Even returned from the dead, there is no respite. Fucking figures.

Without even really thinking about it, Jaylen’s picking up her phone and scrolling to her contact list. It’s only once she finds her thumb hovering over Mike’s contact page that she realizes what she’s doing– more out of instinct than out of will at this point. But even if he could hear Jaylen now, he’s got no way of responding. 

Jaylen just wants to talk to a familiar face, no strings attached, and there’s not much of that going around these days.

All her teammates avoid her nowadays. Jaylen’s not naive; she sees them eyeing her like she’s some sort of caged animal, and nobody wants to be the one to toss her a slab of meat. They’re all scared they’ll be next. Which is fucking stupid– they all know full well she’s only hit players on opposing teams.

Anyways, she doesn’t think any of them would take too kindly to a late-night cold call. Duende offered Jaylen his number when she returned from the shadows, along with a hell of a lot of leeway when it came to missed practices. He told Jaylen she was welcome to call him if she needed anything at all. Still, he’s no Mike. 

No– that’s not fair to Teddy. Nobody could be. Regardless, calling him wouldn’t do Jaylen any good. She wants someone who’ll talk to her like a person, not like a captain. 

“Fuck it,” Jaylen grumbles to herself before pressing the dial button next to Mike’s name. She sits and traces the grooves of the wooden kitchen table while she waits. After five full rings of the dial tone, the line goes silent for a moment too long, and then it’s the same shitty little voicemail message in his shitty little Bellevue accent that Jaylen always teased him for.

“Hey! It’s Mike. Um, I guess I’m not here to pick up your call right now, which means I’m probably playing ball. I’ll call you back when I’m done, but in the meantime leave me a message. If it’s urgent, code word is _knuckleball_. Peace!”

Then she’s left to the silence of the message recording, and blood pounds in her ears against empty static. She’s only just gotten used to that feeling.

“Hey. It’s me.” Jaylen pauses for a moment like Mike could somehow respond, then berates herself for even considering the notion. “I… I don’t know. I just wanted to talk. To somebody.” Voice low, she curls into herself, suddenly self-aware.

She lets out a ragged exhale, just to get something out into the stale air. Just to fill the silence. “I didn’t know who else to call. I think most of me is still in there with you.” Begrudgingly, Jaylen lets herself imagine Mike listening wordlessly at the other end of the line. Like he’d shut up to save his own life.

“Nobody knows what to do with me anymore. You’d get that, I think. Everyone either loved or hated you. But with me… I don’t know.” Jaylen worries absently at a cuticle, and it doesn’t even bleed for a change. It’s long since stopped hurting when she does that. “It’s almost better when people hate me, or fear me– because at least they know what they’re getting into. There’s no sugarcoating it. They should be cautious, sure, but for themselves. Not for me.”

Jaylen imagines being around her is like standing too close to a fire. All of her feels crooked and rough and wolfish in a way that she’s never known before. She’s always looking to break something.

“I like it better when people are straightforward, when they can talk to me without acting like I might, like, combust out of nowhere. Even Dreamy looks at me like I’m delicate. I just want someone to treat me like a person, and she of all people should get that.” 

Jaylen doesn’t know when she got louder, but suddenly she’s hyper-aware of the dissonance between her voice and the hollow air on the other end of the line. She chokes out another shuddering breath, and the next inhale tastes hot and cloyingly metallic. 

The realization that she’s talking to an empty room does nothing for Jaylen’s confidence, but she presses on, softening her tone.

“I just… I love her so goddamn much. But I’m always afraid I’m hurting her, and she’s afraid to tell me. She doesn’t need to… to try and save me, or anything. Nobody needs to. The fans brought me back fucked up, and now they can deal with the consequences just like I am. I didn’t choose to come back this way, but I chose to hit all those players. Every single time.”

It’s true. And the worst fucking thing is that some hungry part of her needs that choice, relishes in it. If Jaylen could go back and live a normal life, she would in an instant, but here at least she means something. At least she’s useful. Whatever this game has put her through, it’s made her more real than she was before.

As for more alive. Well. 

“I mean, I deserve to be held accountable like–” Jaylen stops short at the figure in the shadows of the bedroom doorway.

Her hands shake as she sets her phone facedown on the kitchen table, and she tries not to sound too guilty. “Dream.”

Dreamy blinks, still bleary-eyed, and Jaylen curses herself for not thinking to put on a cup of coffee in advance. “Babe. You don’t need to, like, hang up. I don’t wanna interrupt.” 

“No, it’s fine.” Jaylen looks down at her hands. “I was... talking to Mike. Or his voicemail, I guess. I didn’t know who else to call.” When she glances back up at Dreamy, Jaylen doesn’t think she’s imagining the pity in her eyes.

Dreamy gives a quiet hum of understanding, already drifting over to stand behind Jaylen at the table. “Bad night for sleeping?”

Jaylen shrugs. “As per usual. Figure there’s no point in trying anymore.” She shifts to glance up at Dreamy. “How much did you hear?”

The ensuing beat of hesitation is just enough for Jaylen to feel appropriately self-conscious. Their shitty old radiator shudders to a start behind them. “A bit,” Dreamy admits. “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but. Thin walls. I couldn’t sleep either.” 

She sets a comforting hand on Jaylen’s shoulder, tracing a sleep-warm thumb over the back of her neck. Every touch burns a little bit, since Jaylen’s come back, and she shoves down that initial instinct to flinch away. Instead, she leans into the warmth. Dreamy takes a breath. “I’d always be honest if you were hurting me, you know.” 

Maybe a little too much doubt seeps through in Jaylen’s short sigh, because Dreamy repeats, “I would, Jay.”

“I know you would,” Jaylen replies, carefully measured. “I’m just afraid that I’m doing it without even knowing. I want to know how I make you feel.”

Dreamy nods in the corner of Jaylen’s eye, and Jaylen tries to focus on the soft pressure of Dreamy’s thumb skimming over her skin. “Do I suffocate you?” Dreamy asks, more vulnerable than she was a moment earlier.

“No,” Jaylen replies immediately. “You’re the only thing that grounds me, most of the time.” It’s the only thing she knows for certain. 

It takes Dreamy a moment to respond.

“I thought you were gone again when I woke up,” she says, tone unreadable. The city buzzes on in the silence between them, already rousing itself slowly. “I thought maybe you’d been incinerated again somehow, until I heard your voice out here.”

Jaylen swallows numbly, and it tastes like smoke. “Sorry.” She wishes she could say more.

“Don’t be,” Dreamy murmurs. “Point is, I want you here. I don’t think we have a choice at this point, but you aren’t making me stay. I could leave if I wanted to.”

“Nothing is a choice these days,” Jaylen says. No matter how different life has become since she’s returned, things started changing far before that. Whatever life was before blaseball, there’s no turning back. None of it matters anymore.

It’s like she’s rotting away from the inside out these days, like she’s making up for lost time. It’s impossible to deny the blood pull at the heart of her, raw against the transience of her will. With every game, every wrong pitch, she becomes more myth than human. It’s all a balancing act, and Jaylen is losing.

“Right. So I just don’t want things to feel any more... wrong than they have to be.”

Jaylen laughs, hollow. “Too late.”

“Maybe so. But we’ll figure things out.” This time when she glances back at Dreamy, there’s none of that cautious reverence in her eyes. It’s softer, more familiar. It feels like a promise.

Sometimes Jaylen forgets she’s alive, like her body still doesn’t quite know how to operate. Every burning touch is a reminder of the way she’s spent the last five years. But when she looks up at Dreamy, Jaylen already feels more real. Dreamy is here, and Jaylen is too, and the tangibility of that makes it feel like it matters more.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks so much for reading! i haven't written fic in ages but this was super fun to write and i'm hoping there'll be more to come, especially regarding Operation Make People Appreciate Dreamyjaylen.
> 
> you can find me on tumblr @clerksbian for more blaseball content and general dumbassery. if you'd like to leave a kudos or even comment, that would absolutely make my day! thanks so much again.


End file.
